The Surgeon's Baby Surprise

And how exhausted she looked. He’d seen the dark rings circling her eyes yesterday, along with the slightly sallow skin, so unlike the fresh-faced Evie he’d known a year ago. Just like how thin she’d become, all clear indicators of the toll her illness was taking on her body. He could scarcely believe his surgeon’s mind had allowed her to fob it off on being concerned for the health of her sister-in-law. But as soon as she’d gone and his gut had kicked back in, it hadn’t taken much digging to discover that it was Evie who was unwell, not Annie. That it was Evie who needed the transplant, not Annie.

He felt a kick of empathy. And something else he didn’t care to identify. He shoved it aside; he was here to satisfy himself there really wasn’t something he was missing, and to be a medical shoulder to cry on. Nothing more than that.

Evie stepped onto the porch, pulling the door to behind her, clearly not about to invite him in.

‘What are you even doing here?’

Ironic that he had asked her the same question less than twenty-four hours earlier.

‘Why did you tell me Annie was the one who needed the transplant?’ He was surprised at how difficult it was to keep his tone even and level with her, when at work his professional voice was second nature.

Evie’s face fell. He didn’t miss the way her knuckles went white as she gripped the solid-wood door tighter.

‘I didn’t.’ She tilted her chin defiantly.

‘You implied it, then. It’s semantics, Evie.’

‘How did you find out?’

‘I was concerned. Things didn’t seem to add up.’

To her credit, she straightened her shoulders and met his glare with a defiant one of her own. That was the Evie he knew.

‘You’ve been checking up on me? Reading my file?’

‘You left me with little choice.’ He shrugged, not about to apologise. ‘And don’t talk to me about ethics—for the first time in my career I don’t care. You should have been the one to tell me, Evie.’

‘Well, you should be sorry,’ she challenged, although he didn’t miss the way her eyes darted nervously about. ‘You were the one who always used to be such a stickler about doctor-patient confidentiality.’

‘Is this really the conversation you want to have?’ Max asked quietly.

She stared at him, blinking hard but unspeaking. One beat. Another.

‘You’re right, I’m sorry,’ she capitulated unexpectedly. ‘Yesterday...it’s been playing in my head and now I’m glad you know. I...just didn’t know how to tell you.’

His entire body prickled uneasily.

‘Are you going to invite me in?’

She fidgeted, her eyes cast somewhere over his shoulder, unable to meet his eye.

‘First tell me exactly what you gleaned from my file?’

Max hesitated. There was something behind that question that was both unexpected and disconcerting. The Evie he’d known was feisty, passionate, strong, so unlike the nervous woman standing in front of him, acting as though she had something to hide, as much as she tried to disguise it.

‘As it happens, I didn’t read your file. You can relax. I just spoke to Arabella.’

‘Sorry?’

‘Arabella Goodwin, your nephrologist,’ Max clarified patiently. ‘I told her you’d approached me about the kidney transplant yesterday whilst your sister-in-law was having her tests done. Which, technically, you had done. Imagine my shock when she assumed I knew that Annie was a living donor and that you were the recipient.’

He’d just about managed to cover up his misstep with his fellow surgeon in time.

‘Oh,’ Evie managed weakly. ‘What else did she say?’

‘That your sister-in-law was in for the final repeat tests to ensure nothing had changed before the operation could proceed. I understand you’re due for your transplant next week but you’ll be taken in for the pre-op stage in a matter of days.’

‘And?’ she prompted nervously.

He frowned at her increasing agitation.

‘Do you mean your PRA results and your plasmapheresis?’

He heard her intake of breath before she offered a stiff nod. His frown deepened. Her tenseness made no sense—surely she had to know that the Panel Reactive Antibody blood tests were undertaken by every potential renal transplant patient in order to establish how easy—or difficult—it would be to find a compatible donor?

What was he missing here?

‘Evie, it isn’t uncommon,’ he tried to reassure her. ‘You must know that around twenty-five per cent of patients who need renal transplants go through plasmapheresis to remove dangerous antibodies from their blood and increase their compatibility. You’ve nothing to worry about.’

‘Did she tell you anything else about it?’

She asked the question quietly, but he didn’t miss the shallow rise and fall of her chest.

‘Evie, is this about your previous transplant not working? Is that why you’re so frightened?’

‘My previous transplant?’

He bit back his frustration at her resistance to confiding in him.

‘You have high antibody levels, Evie, so either you’ve had a transfusion, a pregnancy, or a previous transplant. I’m guessing it’s the latter, presumably when you were a kid?’

It would certainly explain her ever-increasing agitation, if she was afraid her body would reject another kidney.

‘You’re guessing a previous transplant,’ she repeated, almost to herself before twisting her head up to him again. ‘You really didn’t read my file.’

‘Of course not.’ Max blew out a breath. ‘Although I admit I was tempted. But I didn’t want to do that to you, or to a colleague like Arabella. I do want to hear it from you, though. Like I said last night, I can imagine you’re having to be strong for your family and that leaves no one to be there to support you.’

Not least since, over the last twelve months, there must have been a veritable battery of tests for Evie. And for Annie, too. But it was Evie who concerned him, right now.

‘Since when do you have the time to leave your surgeries?’ she asked sadly. ‘Or, for that matter, the inclination?’

It was a valid question. He didn’t think he’d have even delayed a surgery for a five-minute coffee with a needy colleague in the past, let alone shuffle his schedule so he could drive a three-hour round trip, not to mention the fact that he was determined not to leave here until Evie had confided all her fears and uncertainties.

He wanted to help her. Needed to help her. There was no point pretending otherwise.

‘Since it was you,’ he answered honestly, ‘I made the time.’

He’d sensed she needed the shoulder to cry on from the moment he’d run into her the previous day, but he’d had no idea just how much until she stared at him with wide, suddenly glistening eyes, before almost buckling at the door. He moved forward and swept her up before she hit the ground.

‘Let’s get you inside.’

He had no idea what Evie wanted from him as he carried her through the hallway. She was staring at him, blinking back the tears, and he felt as though she was evaluating him, as though somehow he’d just passed some kind of test he hadn’t even realised he was taking.

He crossed over an original-looking, slightly broken-up parquet floor, past family pictures of people he didn’t recognise, and past a coat rack sagging under the weight of coats and waterproof jackets in a rainbow of colours. Pairs of shoes and trainers, women’s, men’s and clearly a young boy’s. An old pram and a box of toys.

There was no doubt it was a family house, practically bursting at the seams. And there was nothing of Evie he really recognised about it.

Finally reaching a quiet living room, just as packed with paraphernalia as the hallway, Max lowered her carefully to the floor.

‘This isn’t where I’d have pictured you. I take it this is your sister-in-law’s home?’

‘Yes,’ Evie answered slowly. ‘And my brother’s, obviously. I lost my flat at the centre when I became too tired to work there. Annie invited me to move in with them about nine months ago when I... I needed the help.’

She stopped short of whatever she’d been about to say. He didn’t think now was the time to push her.

‘That can’t have been an easy thing to do.’

‘It wasn’t,’ Evie answered, her voice brittle.

‘You sound surprised.’

‘I didn’t expect you to be so sympathetic. I thought you were all about career, career, career.’ She chopped her hand in the air to emphasise her words. ‘Drink?’

The sudden change of topic caught him off guard. Did she really think him so heartless?

‘Okay.’

She left the room and he heard her bustle about the kitchen. He’d wanted to ask her what yesterday had been about, the way she’d kissed him, their intimacy. Had he pushed her, or was her desire for him genuine? But then, how could it be when she was as ill as she was?

Now didn’t feel like the right moment to challenge her; he needed to bide his time. Standing up, Max searched for a distraction, for the first time allowing himself to look properly at their surroundings. A picture on the back wall caught his interest. A photo of Evie with what had to be her brother and sister-in-law at their wedding. His eyes scanned over the other photos, mainly of Annie’s family, older ones of a baby, growing into a young boy maybe nine or ten years old. A couple with Evie in them, in various fashions and hairstyles, and Max smiled. There was no denying that Evie and her brother were siblings, with similar features and colouring, and yet, whilst Evie was undeniably feminine, her brother looked strong and confident. Not as if Evie needed Max to support her at all.

It should please him to think that Evie didn’t need more help, yet Max found himself bridling at the idea that she didn’t need him. Suddenly a baby photo on the bookshelf snagged his gaze.

Recent. Presumably the baby who used that pram in the hallway. The picture was in a double frame with one as the close-up of the baby that had first caught his attention, the other a photo of Evie with a new baby. A new niece most likely. The baby had to take after her father, but the similarities he’d already observed meant that he could imagine it would be what any baby of Evie herself could look like. Max’s chest actually constricted. Evie looked particularly ill and yet the look of unadulterated love on her face was unmistakeable. He’d been right thinking this was exactly the kind of life, of family, that Evie would want for herself. The only reason she hadn’t got it yet was because of her illness.

He could never give Evie the family she would want, once she got the transplant she needed. And it was foolhardy pretending he was here just for support for a woman who was, effectively, nothing more than a one-night stand. He needed to go. Get back to his life at Silvertrees. Refocus on his work. Forget about Evangeline Parker.

Moving quickly away from the photos and back to the armchair to wait for Evie, Max sought a way to best extricate himself. He’d have the drink she was preparing, and then make his exit.

‘Anyway, I just thought I’d make sure you’re okay. It’s great that you have a living donor in your sister-in-law,’ he offered when she came back through the door at last, a jug of orange juice and two glasses in hand.

‘Yes.’

‘No waiting on a transplant list. The procedure can be done at the earliest opportunity, before the body goes into kidney failure, and before it puts additional stress on your other organs.’

‘Yes.’

He tried to bite his tongue as she poured the first juice, but as her hand hovered over the second glass, he couldn’t stay silent.

‘Are you supposed to be drinking that? I’d have thought you should be limiting your potassium intake.’

‘What are you? The juice police?’ she grumbled, but he noted that she set the jug down without pouring a glass for herself. Settling herself on the couch opposite him. Distancing herself once again.

‘Evie...’ his voice was gravelly with concern, startling even himself ‘...I’m here. Talk to me.’

So much for extricating himself.

* * *

Evie had barely managed to stop herself from sinking back into his arms and confessing everything. He was here.

Here.

And more than that, he’d uttered the words she’d never even dreamed she would hear from him. He had made the time to come to her because he knew she needed him.

He just didn’t know how much, or why. And she had to be sure—she owed it to Imogen. She couldn’t bring Max into her daughter’s life until she knew it was absolutely worth it. That Max was worth it.

Not that she had a clue how she would even begin to tell him, anyway.

‘How are you feeling?’ he asked gently. ‘Besides the obvious.’

Tears pricked her eyes again. After years of dealing with troubled young adults, her own father, and even the unkindness of Max’s parents, she was used to the darker side of human nature. But sometimes other people demonstrated a depth of human kindness that was truly humbling. Not least the way her sister-in-law had stepped up to offer her a kidney, and then the way Annie and her brother had opened their home to her without question.

And now here was Max—the man with whom she’d shared little more than the most incredible and the only five-night stand of her life—and he had tracked her down here because he was a good person. How far would that goodness extend, though?

‘Besides the obvious physical exhaustion?’ she asked with a weak smile in a bid to buy herself more time. ‘I’m feeling mentally drained.’

It might send him running, but at least then she would know.

Max said nothing. Instead, he stood up and crossed the room to sit next to her on the couch. She couldn’t hold back the torrent of words any longer.

‘There have just been tests. So many tests that I thought they would never end. Not to mention all the tests which Annie endured just to help me.’ Evie lifted her hands to count off on her fingers. ‘EKGs to check her heart rhythm, chest X-rays to rule out lung disease or lung tumours, pap smears and mammograms, CAT scans to check for kidney stones, not to mention a whole gamut of blood tests.’

She cast Max a sheepish glance.

‘You’ll already know that, I’m sorry. It’s just I sometimes can’t believe what she’s put up with, for me.’

‘You’re important to her.’ Max spoke quietly. ‘And to your brother. Besides, you can’t tell me you wouldn’t have done the same thing for one of them.’

That was true. But it wasn’t her doing it for them, was it?

‘I just wish they didn’t have to go through this for me. What if Annie gives me her kidney and her son needs it? She and my brother have a nine-year-old boy.’

‘Is there any reason to think he would need it?’ he asked calmly.

She knew what Max was getting at. PKD was usually inherited. Her nephew was about as healthy as wild, boisterous, vitality-filled nine-year-old boys got.

‘My brother doesn’t carry the gene, and my nephew was checked out and found clear. But that’s not the point,’ she objected. ‘He could get hit by a car, develop some other undiagnosed kidney disorder, or anything.’

‘Unlikely, given what you’ve just said,’ Max soothed. ‘Is that what happened with you? You only discovered you had a kidney disease this last year?’

Old memories crashed into Evie out of the blue, sideswiping her. Memories of her mother and her stepfather, and of her brother. How they’d rallied around her as a teenager when they’d first discovered there was a problem. She couldn’t have hoped for a closer-knit family back then and, with Annie as her sister-in-law now, she was still so very fortunate. But she missed her parents. Almost every single day. Her heart ached for the fact that they would never even know about their granddaughter. Imogen would never have the incredible memories of loving grandparents that her nephew had.

‘Evie?’

She’d been staring off into the distance. With a start, Evie dragged herself back to the present.

‘Sorry. What were we saying?’

‘Did you discover your illness this past year?’

‘No,’ she admitted, her eyes meeting his. ‘I was diagnosed with polycystic kidney disease when I was a kid, but I only started entering the first stages of renal failure one year ago.’

That had been the same week she’d allowed herself to break her rules and sleep with Max.

‘What happened?’

‘I’d been working with a particularly troubled young boy when I got kicked.’

‘That must have been some kick,’ he growled.

‘I guess.’

She wasn’t about to tell him it had been so forceful it had propelled her several metres backwards across the office. The kick hadn’t caused the problem, it had merely been a catalyst. She tried to lighten the tone.

‘But it was right over the site of my weakest kidney. Murphy’s law, I guess.’

‘I see.’ Max nodded grimly. ‘No wonder you left your job. I would imagine that would have been a hard decision for you. I know how passionate you were about your work there.’

Evie frowned.

‘I haven’t left for good, I just took leave when I became too exhausted to work there.’

She wasn’t prepared for his reaction.

‘Evie, you can’t possibly go back to work there.’

‘Of course I can.’ She bristled at his authoritative tone. ‘As soon as I’m well again.’

If all was well again.

‘Don’t be stupid.’ He snorted with derision. ‘If this is what can happen to you before the transplant, think of the damage it could cause right over the site of a graft.’

Evie suppressed a shudder and folded her arms defiantly across her chest.

‘Who do you think you are, ordering me around?’

‘I’m not ordering you around.’ He gritted his teeth at her, clearly trying to control his frustration.

They stared at each other in silence. Evie wondered whether, like her, Max was questioning how such an argument had come out of nowhere.

‘I’m sorry.’ Max held up his hands at last. ‘You were telling me how you came to find out about your kidney disorder.’

‘Right,’ she acknowledged half-heartedly. ‘We knew from tests back then that my brother wasn’t a match, but my mother had been, so...’

She tailed off, unable to finish the sentence. They’d always assumed her mother would be her donor when the time came. As if losing her mother hadn’t been bad enough to start with.

‘Your mother is no longer around?’ Max surmised, the previous heat now gone from his voice.

‘She died just before I moved to Silvertrees. Well, to the centre, you know?’

‘I see,’ he said again.

‘It was a car crash,’ she choked out, shaking her head.

Clearly he was taking everything she said on face value, listening to her as a friend, not as a surgeon.

He trusted her. She hadn’t realised that before.

If he had his surgeon’s hat on he wouldn’t have assumed earlier that her high-level HLA sensitisation was a result of a previous transplant. He’d have registered that she was talking about end-stage renal failure now and not a previous transplant failing, which would leave him with only two other realistic possibilities for her high antibody levels in her PRA results. A blood transfusion, or the pregnancy.

But it wouldn’t be long before he worked it out. And Evie knew she had to get in there first and tell him about Imogen. His reactions this afternoon had shown more concern for her well-being than she could have imagined. Max wasn’t as uninterested in her as she’d been led to believe.

‘For what it’s worth—’ his voice cut through the silence ‘—I think the death of your mother, so close to your own recent diagnosis, is what’s causing you not to think straight.’

‘Think straight?’

‘About Annie being your donor? I can tell you’re having doubts, Evie. You’re physically and emotionally worn out and you’re getting cold feet because the operation is imminent. You know yourself how patients can get before an operation, any operation. I hope you’re not considering refusing Annie’s offer.’

She’d thought about it. A thousand times. But on the few occasions where she’d raised it with Annie, her sister-in-law had refused to listen, lovingly laying on the guilt as she reminded Evie that she was all Imogen had, and that she owed it to her daughter to accept the kidney.

‘I’m not going to refuse. Annie wouldn’t allow it,’ Evie hiccupped. ‘But it doesn’t necessarily make it any easier.’

‘It’s called the gift of life for a reason, Evie.’ He stroked her hand gently. ‘And I understand your initial concerns. But think of it this way—you’re clearly a close family and you owe it to your niece and nephew to be the cool aunt you clearly already are to them.’

Evie froze, his words hurling spikes of ice down her spine.

‘My niece?’

‘I saw the photographs.’

He jerked his head to the bookshelf. Nausea churned up Evie’s stomach. This was it. She had to do it now.

She couldn’t find the words and the room swayed. She grabbed at the couch; the familiar feel of the piping on the cushion was comforting and she plucked at it absently.

‘Evie? Are you okay?’ His voice was sharp, his hand slipping into her hair to force her to look at him.

The hallway clock ticked audibly, outside the street was quiet—to anyone else it might even appear peaceful—a gaggle of geese passing noisily outside the window.

‘Evie.’ He snapped his fingers in front of her face.

Slowly she lifted her eyes to his.

‘That’s not my niece,’ she whispered.

He looked surprised but still didn’t understand. A gurgle of semi-hysterical laughter bubbled up inside her.

Max Van Berg, the high-flying surgeon who never missed a thing in a patient, was missing the one thing staring him right in the face.

‘Imogen is my daughter.’ Her eyes raked over his face, willing him to really hear what she was telling him. ‘She’s your daughter.’

CHAPTER THREE

‘YOU HAVE A DAUGHTER?’

He knew the words were there but his brain didn’t appear to be processing the message clearly. It might as well have been trying to work in a vat of thick treacle.

‘We have a daughter,’ Evie repeated tentatively.

Slowly, slowly, his brain began to pick up speed.

‘I have a daughter,’ he repeated, his hand dropping from Evie’s hair as he pushed himself away from her. ‘I have a three-month-old baby, and you didn’t tell me until now?’

Evie crossed her arms over her chest, refusing to meet his eyes.

‘Five months old,’ she answered shakily.

‘Sorry?’

‘Imogen is five months old. Not three.’

He turned to pin her with a narrow gaze as she reached for his glass and took a generous gulp as though she was parched. It took a moment for him to register.

‘That’s enough,’ he bit out, taking the juice from her and setting it out of reach before pushing himself up from the couch and moving over to the window, reinforcing the space between them.

‘Drinking that won’t help you,’ he muttered, staring out at the uneventful street scene.

‘Thank you,’ she whispered so quietly he almost missed it.

He could certainly go for a drink himself. A drink of the large, stiff variety, not a glass of orange juice. And he rarely drank.

‘We slept together a year ago. You’re telling me the baby was two months premature?’

‘That’s not unusual given my...condition.’

He had to strain to hear her.

‘The baby was born at thirty-two weeks? Thirty-three?’

‘Thirty-two weeks. I went onto dialysis five days a week to carry her for as long as I could, but my body was under pressure, so they made the decision...’

Part of his brain told him that she’d done well to get that far. Her health would have been deteriorating rapidly as the growing foetus put more and more strain on her already stressed organs. It certainly explained why she’d gone from healthy when they were together a year ago, to being taken in for her transplant within the week.

‘You never thought to...not to have it? For your health? For the baby’s health?’